Something is waking

It’s been more than two years since I picked up a paintbrush. More than six since I painted anything other than a gift for someone. Last week I started a workshop called Get Unstuck (with Melaina Faranda) and while I haven’t been stuck creatively with my writing, I have been … intense, too focused on the imagined outcome to really write something interesting.

As for my visual art, I’ve been hideously stuck.

This week I made an egg. I haven’t eaten one since 2020 but during the first class of the workshop I kept picturing eggs. New beginnings. Something about to start.

I had been shredding old paperwork in the office. When I posted about it on Facebook (as you do) a young friend suggested I make some recycled paper from it. I watched a few paper making videos but I haven’t had the time to make a screen to make the paper.

So instead I made an egg which was even easier although I needed some stronger sandpaper to smooth the edges. I though about making a moon for my sister but I wanted this to be just a dumb thing, not a gift, not a prop or a thing to use for anything else. It’s a bit of a symbol. The paper is from the old accounts payable invoices from our business. We poured blood, tears and a lot of sweat into that business so it’s was lovely to shred the paper and make it into something … else. Just a thing.

Note to Self: Not everything has to have a point.

The egg is painted in the colour I want to paint most of my house (although it looks quite yellow in the pic) and pictured (below) alongside some daisies from the garden and a feather gifted to me by the magpies who live there, the ones that sit on the powerline to my house and poop on me when they can. Three times in the past two weeks can’t be a coincidence, can it?

I have written before about black feathers and I was happy to see one in the pot under the lemon tree that has struggled ever since I potted it. I’m trying to tell myself that my garden is for enjoyment purposes only and it doesn’t matter if everything gets eaten by grubs or shat on by birds.

So this is my easy egg. I wanted to make something quick and easy, something strange and weird and utterly useless. I’m allowing myself to make silly things with absolutely zero self-censorship. If I could just get to the point of making something without needing to post about it, maybe I’ll be getting somewhere …

When I have more time will I waste it doing other things or will I remember this time when everything feels like it’s the most important thing or will I do the actual important thing: writing and making and just being?